1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process and apparatus for separating linked food products, and more specifically to completely separating sausages, wieners, or similar products and to remove the links from the ends of the product, i.e, delinking, through mechanical agitation, through the use of direct contact with refrigerant cryogens.
2. Brief Description of the Related Art
In the art of linked food product production, it is desirable to process a linked product containing multiple individual linked pieces by separating the individual linked pieces from one another, to remove any excess casing that may be attached to one or both ends of the individual linked piece ("delinking"), and to freeze the separated, delinked pieces.
Automatic cutting and grading systems, and sausage cutting systems, have been used to cut and separate individual pieces from a linked product, e.g., sausages and wieners. These prior cutting systems, however, only separate the individual pieces of the linked product. The cutting systems do not delink the product, i.e., remove the link (excess casing) from the end of the product. Accordingly, these prior cutting systems, although separating the individual pieces of the linked product, fail to delink the pieces, resulting in an undesirable product which includes excess casing. Furthermore, these prior cutting systems require an extremely high level of maintenance, because of the dulling and fouling of the cutting elements. They also have a high operational intensity, requiring many equipment adjustments throughout a production run.
Prior automatic cutting systems also do not provide any means by which the separated product can be frozen, which thereby requires additional equipment, handling, and production costs to freeze the cut and separated product for packaging and delivery.
Furthermore, prior automatic cutting systems suffer from frequent stoppages or jam-ups due to improper feeding of the product into the cutting equipment. As a result, there is a high occurrence of production downtime, which further increases production costs.
Prior automatic cutting systems are additionally disadvantageous because they suffer from high product reject rates. Unacceptable product is produced when the linked product is mis-cut by the automatic cutting system, e.g., the product is mis-cut when it is cut in half instead of the individual pieces being mutually separated. High product reject rates exacerbate the aforementioned deficiencies of prior automatic cutting systems, i.e., dulling and fouling of the cutting and separating elements, produce even higher levels of operational intensity, require additional handling of the rejected pieces, and incur increased down time due to system stoppages.
Linked products have also been separated and delinked manually. For example, scissors have been used to separate and delink a linked product. Manual separation and delinking is also extremely disadvantageous for at least several reasons.
The separation and delinking process first becomes very labor intensive when manual labor and scissors are used to separate and delink the product. Manual separation and delinking also exposes the laborer to the potential hazards of personal injury from the scissors. This requirement for manual labor, and its associated laborer safety concerns, understandably makes this a very costly process. Manual separation and delinking is also a slow and laborious process, which impacts on production efficiencies and therefore, ultimately, production cost. Manual separation and delinking processes, like automatic cutting systems, are also unable to freeze the product while performing the separation and delinking, which again increases the requirements for additional equipment and production line costs.
Tumblers have been used in the prior art to process food products. Tumblers have been used to massage meat food products, blend seasonings with food products, and to hydrate food products. Tumblers are commonly available in a variety of sizes and configurations. Tumblers have not, however, been used to separate and delink, and further to freeze food products.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an economical and efficient process and apparatus for separating and delinking a linked product which does not suffer from the aforementioned failings of the prior art.
It is therefore another object of the present invention to provide a process and apparatus for separating and delinking a linked product which also can freeze the separated and delinked product.